Typically, when I’m taking photos of my feathered friends, I aim to get a good view of the bird’s eye; but this past weekend the roles were reversed and I got a wonderful bird’s eye view!

My friend Joni and I (you met her back in April when we were waterfall wandering) had such a wonderful adventure as we went hang gliding for the first time!

Here we are, all geared up, in our pre-flight photo.

Now, lest you think we are totally crazy (which might be a fair assumption!) we did have a pilot with us. But can I just go ahead and tell you, it was SO MUCH FUN!

Here is a picture of each of us hanging about at cloud level.

It was incredibly peaceful being up in the sky, looking down at the beauty below. And honestly, with a little instruction, it was pretty easy to steer. In the video below, you can hear my pilot, Tim, giving me a quick tutorial.

I was hoping we would somehow get to share a thermal with a hawk and soar together for a bit, but alas, the only hawk we spotted was down toward the treetops, which was definitely not where we wanted the glider to end up!

I was wondering if I would be nervous, but I really wasn’t at all. The folks at the Lookout Mountain Flight Park did a great job preparing us, as did our pilots. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it.

When it was time to come in for a landing, we opted for the roller coaster approach, taking some dips and turns on the way down.

And a good time was definitely had by all!